Hail, Holy Queen

Early on when I began to attend Mass at a Catholic church, there was a bookmark pinned to the bulletin board which said, "How to Pray the Rosary".  The concluding prayer was the Salve Regina:

Hail, Holy Queen, Mother of Mercy,
our life, our sweetness, and our hope.
To thee do we cry, poor banished children of Eve.
To thee do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping
in this vale of tears. Turn, then, most gracious Advocate
thine eyes of mercy toward us; and, after this our exile,
show unto us the blessed fruit of thy womb, Jesus.
O clement, o pious, o sweet Virgin Mary;
Queen of the most Holy Rosary, pray for us,
that we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.  

I have since learned from Charlene Spretnak's book, Missing Mary, that this prayer used to be said at the end of every Mass! At least where I live, this is no longer true, and from what Charlene says, it's generally not the case. Her book argues that since Vatican II, there has been a decline in Marian devotion, and the full spiritual presence and meaning of Mary was marginalized and removed from its once central place in Catholic theology. I was alarmed when I read this. Had I met Mary and found the Catholic Church too late? But no, she says, there is a strong, grassroots movement to restore Mary's honored place, not just based on her strictly biblical presence, but on the traditional, cosmological presence of what she calls Big Mary, the biblicalplus version that venerates both the Nazarene village woman of the Bible and the Queen of Heaven, divinized by virtue of her Son.

In this blog I will explore the theology of Mary as I understand it, the Christological and mystical dimensions, and her relationship to the Church. I wish to celebrate Mary, to allow her to lead me to Jesus, who is both the Word and Wisdom Incarnate, and to explore how she embodies the sacred feminine and enriches a living Catholicism. Marian devotion, I believe, is in fact indispensable to the practice of True Religion. I'm bringing Mary back! I hope you will join me on this journey.